Follow the crazy adventures of an Alabama cyclist taking on the Race Across America in 2015.

Huntsville Omnium Day 1

Pro/1/2 road race
I wrote last night that I was hoping to report on more wins this weekend, and I am happy to report that my teammate Pat Allison took the Pro/1/2 road race win this morning. Quick summary of the race – Pat initiated the break by rolling off with Bryant Funston (Marx and Bensdorf) at the start of the second of six 10 mile laps. This was after an initial lap full of breaks, well covered by teammates Mike Lackey, Chris Allison, and Stuart Lamp. Pat and Bryant extended their lead to a minute and a half by the end of the second lap. It was at this point that Will Fyfe (BBC) put in a strong solo move. About a minute or two later, Jake Andrews put in a good attack with one other rider. This was on a long uphill drag. Chris Brown (Litespeed) and a Krystal rider counter attacked as the field caught Jake. I was on Chris’s wheel when he attacked so there was quickly three of us rapidly approaching Will. Will hopped on when we caught him making a chase group of four. We had a good 30 seconds on the field. With a teammate up the road, I limited my work mainly to just pulling through and a couple times skipping rotation. It took more than one complete lap, but eventually we made it up to Pat and Bryant. During this time, however, the field had closed the gap down to 50 seconds at one point. As we sorted out the rotations in the somewhat windy conditions and settled into a good rhythm, the six of us extended the lead back up to 2 minutes. Towards the beginning of the last lap, there was lots of attacking. Our break kept coming back together, though, so eventually we started rotating well again. Then with about 3 miles to go, there was an attack that brought us down to 5 riders. I was hurting from all the attacks that the others in the break had made so I had to change my original plan (to attack a lot in the last few miles) down to one attack with about a mile to go. I figured this would force the other breakaway riders to chase me while Pat could just ride wheels. This worked great and since I was already tired from my attack and had very little chance in the sprint, I went ahead and led out the sprint as well. Pat timed it perfectly to come around for the win. I came in behind Chris and the Krystal rider.

Masters 35+ road race
This race started out with Ron Williams (Alabama Masters) taking a solo flyer for pretty much a whole lap. Then after he was caught, he went again with one other rider – Shawn Dobbs (Weber). Not very many people were willing to work so it ended up being Chris Brown (Litespeed), Travis Werts (Sonic), and I rotating through at the front of the group. We were slowly bringing back the gap, but everyone else in the group was along for the free ride. This wasn’t going to work, so Chris attacked hard coming out of the first turn on the course. The two of us quickly had a gap and worked very painfully hard to bridge up to Ron and Shawn by the end of the long straightaway between the first turn and the second turn. At this point, there were only two more laps left in the race and we worked very well together until about 3/4 of the way through the last lap taking our lead up from just 25 seconds when we made the bridge to 2.5 minutes on the last lap. About 3/4 of the way through that lap, Shawn attacked at about the exact same spot I had been planning on attacking. I am glad I didn’t though because in the chase, I cramped up in both legs. Fortunately, the pace slowed down once we caught Shawn, and the cramps subsided. From this point to the end (about 3 miles), I was going to do everything I could to not do any work so that I could maybe have one more burst in the legs for the finishing sprint. This strategy worked well, but it was only good enough for second (barely – see photo) as Chris Brown took the win.

Time trial
This was an interesting time trial at only 1k long. I knew that it would be a short intense effort, but I went out way too hard and cramped in my right leg. So I sat up and soft-pedaled the rest of the race. Unfortunately, I think that is going to cost me a lot in the omnium because the time trial was weighted heavily. I can only hope that enough people didn’t do the time trial for me to still score high enough to have a shot at the overall tomorrow.